Amazon starts selling wine online, with direct shipping from wineries

After a series of unsuccessful attempts over the years, Amazon.com made its long-awaited move into the world of online wine sales this morning.

The company’s new Amazon Wine portal offers bottles from wineries around the country. Those wineries will ship directly to customers in twelve states at launch.

It’s an interesting move for Amazon, and a significant moment for the wine industry overall. Amazon says it will offer a wide variety of wine, from a Francis Ford Coppola Winery 2011 Rosso & Bianco red blend Rosso for $12, to premium wines such as the Hall 2009 Kathryn Hall Cabernet Sauvignon for $110.

Shipping will be available for up to six bottles for $9.99. One complication when it comes to wine is the state-to-state regulations for selling alcohol. At launch, Amazon says shipping will be available to California, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho,Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming and the District of Columbia, “with more coming soon.”

The Wall Street Journal reported in September that Amazon would charge wineries a 15 percent commission on sales.

Amazon’s size can have a major impact in any market that it enters, for better and worse. The company’s separate move into digital book publishing has been praised by independent authors while causing no shortage of disruption for major book publishers.

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Guest

Congrats to Amazon on the launch!

Guest

Huh? Seems like a weird 3P solution. The structure of the site doesn’t really lend itself to wine not to mention the prices are poor. selection is limited (no imports?), no amazon prime, and no wine education. I am surprised they did not have a broader vision but I guess taxes and shipping prices are probably part of the concern. Some of these things they might work out long-term but for now there are better places to shop like klwines.com and lot18.com.

http://seainhd.com/ SEAinHD

This is definitely a long-term bet. Its an open market now and wineries can join at their own pace and set their own prices. Amazon has very little skin in the game and it will expand organically. With 3p they can open to wine stores to compete directly with the wineries and create cost competition. imports will come as they get wine shops and wine distributors to join.

we’ll probably see amazon buy a big wine ecommerce store in the next couple years.

Dave

Totally agree, this is a weak initial effort. Very poor selection, high prices, no amazon prime. Not at all competitive with other options. Surprised they bothered to launch with this.

http://vinoshopping.com/ VinoShopping

Amazon.com can sell anything but they will do it the same way they offer other things, and won’t worry about small wineries.

Pawan

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